How bad is it?

Pretty bad.

I’ve been reading British press reaction to the news that David Kelly, the British scientist who committed suicide last week, was the BBC’s source for their story on the “sexed-up” Iraq weapons dossier.

The Times goes for “BBC in crisis as Blair mood swings”
The Guardian has “BBC under fire as it admits Dr Kelly was source”.
The Independent runs with “BBC chairman under fire after admitting Kelly was key source”.

Even the BBC has been forced to acknowledge that it has now become the key focus of the story and has helpfully provided a round-up of press reaction

Andrew Gilligan, the BBC journalist who wrote the original story, has been forced to deny that he made the whole thing up and the BBC’s director of news, Richard Sambrook, has issued a statement saying that, once again, he stands by his man. It remains to be seen whether this time round Greg Dyke, Gavyn Davies and the rest of the BBC’s board of governors will be so eager to join him in endorsing Gilligan’s journalism.

Those who have been watching the BBC carefully in recent times (Biased BBC for example) will have known something like this was on the cards. Second-rate journalism, poor editorial judgement and sheer bad management at BBC News have unfortunately provided a steady stream of bad examples for anyone with an interest in journalistic standards and media bias.

It’s good to see that other bloggers, both back home and Down Under, are starting to comment on the story: Jeff Jarvis has a mammoth post up that speaks directly to the issues involved and Nzpundit hits the nail on the head with a couple of posts yesterday and another one today.